Why Self-Care Is Essential for Success as a Nursing Student
In a time where life is constantly moving without stopping, the practice of self-care has become vitally necessary to promote the overall well-being of nursing students.
Burnout as a Nursing Student
The life of a nursing student can be quite demanding. From class sessions that span several hours to clinical practice experiences that often last over eight hours per day, students can often find themselves feeling exhausted. Left unchecked, this constant activity and exhaustion can lead to burnout. According to webmd.com, burnout can develop when an individual feels overwhelmed and emotionally drained by life events and responsibilities. It can affect mental and physical health and significantly impact productivity. Nursing students should try to avoid burnout, but how do you do that with such a demanding and stressful schedule? The key to managing this is self-care.
What Is Self-Care and Why Is It Important?
The World Health Organization (WHO) describes self-care as the ability for individuals, families, and communities to effectively prevent illness, maintain health, and treat illness with or without the support of health professionals. The ability to engage in healthy living practices can help individuals cope better with physical, mental, and emotional struggles.
Self-care practices can span across various aspects of life, including physical, mental, social, spiritual, and personal. This can include taking a walk, working out, creating a gratitude practice, or even just talking to a fellow student or colleague about topics not related to school or work. Engaging in self-care can look different for each person, but the most important thing is to build a regular routine around it.
Self-Care as a Nursing Student
The busy life of a student can make self-care seem unattainable, but starting small can go a long way. For Jennifer Bartholomew, a senior nursing student at Northwest University’s Mark and Huldah Buntain College of Nursing (BCON), this means setting aside thirty minutes every morning to order her “intentions for the day through prayer and journaling.” Along with this, she also tries to exercise daily and connect with friends outside of her nursing cohort. Doing these practices have enabled Jennifer to find success more readily in her daily tasks as a busy nursing student.
Self-care practices are unique for everyone. Danette Ver Woert, an associate professor in the BCON, has found that sleep is one of the most valuable applications of self-care in her life. In the past, Ver Woert would often underestimate its value in promoting cognitive retention and emotional coping skills, but she has now found it to be the most important tool for effective self-care. Along with sleep, Ver Woert makes the effort to counteract harmful self-talk by identifying how her inner monologue has begun to negatively impact her. She has found that her task-oriented nature sometimes has the tendency to get the best of her and can prevent her from taking breaks and celebrating small victories:
"Sometimes I notice that my inner manager is getting really loud. My inner manager never wants me to take a break or evaluate when I'm overdoing it. When I notice that's happening, I ask my inner manager to step back and give me some space. That little extra space helps me celebrate the little wins along the way and not focus on the outcome so much."
How Northwest University Supports Self-Care
The life of a nursing student can be demanding and overwhelming, so practicing self-care is essential to promoting healthy cognitive function and processing. Especially in a physically and emotionally taxing profession like nursing, it becomes even more important to set healthy habits as a nursing student so that coping with stress will come more easily when working full-time. As many of our nursing students and faculty can attest, it is impossible to pour from an empty vessel, and being intentional with self-care largely improves work and study.
Here at Northwest University, we offer students the opportunity to relax and unwind through the Everette D. Greenley Wellness Center. Students have access to a self-care room where they can grab a free cup of tea or hot cocoa, sit in a massage chair, experience aromatherapy, and even engage in full spectrum light therapy. If you are a current or future nursing student, don’t let the demands of your important work discourage you. While it might be tough at times, a good self-care routine can help you not only survive but thrive as a nursing student.